The Red Stuff
by milkmoth
Summary: Rangiku tries to convince Gin to give it up, only to realize that neither of them ever will. Gin/Ran, Gin/Aizen, AU. Oneshot.


a/n: Originally posted on livejournal. An alternate, real-world historical (don't ask me when; I don't know) Aizen/Gin/Rangiku thing. Enjoy and review.

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The rhythm of the jail that afternoon was broken by the jingle of bracelets and the click of high heels. When she got closer, some of them could even smell her, straightforward like soap, with the bold, flowery scent of her perfume. They looked her over slowly. Some looked twice.

She was a fine woman, too mature to be called young and too vigorous to be old. She had large breasts and hair that cascaded as well as any hair could, eyes that were sharp and clear-blue. She walked like a cat, but for the fact that she seemed to have business to attend to. There was a visitor name card pinned to her large breast, and on it, her name. The workers bent over in all manners, twisted and contorted themselves, but couldn't make out the scribble.

_Rangiku Matsumoto,_ it read.

Rangiku Matsumoto spoke with the turnkey. Rangiku Matsumoto raised the pitch of her voice. Rangiku Matsumoto smiled a quivery smile and said something in a quivery way. Her eyelashes batted for a split-second, subliminal advertising. The turnkey finally mumbled something and pressed the button that allowed her passage.

It wasn't soon before another man passed by and gave his superior a conspicuously curious look. The turnkey shook his head in resignation.

"Didn't you see the poor girl? She's here for our latest," he said. "God, is he a nasty piece of work. I'm surprised there's anyone left for him. Especially a girl like that."

The other man was holding a stack of papers, obviously his excuse for walking by. Even with his burden, he was too curious to take them straight back to his desk. "She was a pretty one. Did you catch her name?" After a second of silence, when it became apparent that the turnkey did not want to listen to that train of thought, the man pursued a different though, in a softer voice. "You start to wonder why they went mad. They weren't always alone."

"They're just born that way. I guess. There's no other way to explain it – did you hear what he did to the last one?"

"Gives me shivers every time I think about it. Think I felt sick when I read it in the papers."

"Fourteen victims."

"All bloodied up. Found 'em dead. No reason they can tell, for half of 'em."

Rangiku Matsumoto's step acquired a quiver, though not nearly a quiver so dramatic as she had slipped into her voice for the turnkey's benefit. She had sharp ears, and she'd heard what they said as their caution waned and their voices grew from whispers to normal speech.

Rangiku Matsumoto passed gray cell after gray cell. The prisoners were mostly listless, but a couple shouted crude things in her direction. She ignored them

She came to Gin. She'd been told not to touch his cell, but she wrapped her hand around one of the bars anyway, taunting him. "I'm surprised they let you stay in a cell like this."

"I'm surprised you came."

Rangiku stared at him for a second. Something broke down inside her, and suddenly she no longer had the strength she'd flashed only seconds ago. He reduced her to something else completely. She kept her eyes trained on him regardless.

"Are you going to confess?"

"Confess? I ain't done nothin'."

"Fourteen. You've done fourteen. And you'll be doing life, unless you give him up. Maybe twenty, if you do."

He smiled, as if remembering. "You know why only life an' not death, Ran? They think I'm batshit insane. Can't be charged with a death sentence. You're lyin' when you say twenty - they ain' lettin' me out, and I ain't confessin' a thing."

She took in a deep breath. "They think you're some kind of political assassin." Her tone was entirely flat, giving no hint to whether she believed or disbelieved the theory. She didn't know which she believed.

"You know I just like the red stuff."

She leaned in. Her blue eyes flashed. Suddenly, she realized:

"Aizen," she said, and for all her stern looks her voice was stifled, as if she were choking out the words. "That goddamn son of a bitch. You're not going to let him shove the blame on you, are you?"

"An' if it were?"

She jerked back again, blinking her mascara-laden eyes rapidly. "You wouldn't name him."

He didn't answer. She gave him one last stern, wet look before turning away.

"Ran," he called, casually. She looked back and he smiled again. She wanted, for the first time in her life, to punch that smile off his face. She envisioned it vividly: how her bracelets would jingle, how his nose would crack like gunfire. How he would smile, crookedly this time, with blood dripping from his nose, and tell her sorry. And they would be okay again. Settling things with violence, like the street rats they were.

She could embrace him tight, and maybe his blood would stain her shirt, get all over her hands as she cupped his face like a child's, forced him to look at her. She wouldn't cry, but he wouldn't, either. In twenty years (if she got lucky), he could be out and living with her again, even if they were both old and it was only just her ratty apartment in the slums. Even if he couldn't get a job after being in the clinker. Even if she had to work her nails to nubs trying to support the two of them. She would get him out, and they would be together.

Instead she stood primly, holding the straps of her purse with both her white, white, calloused hands.

_Batshit insane._

"Yes?"

"It was good seein' you."

She turns right back out and leaves. Her eyes burn too much for her to even considering spitting to show her contempt, but in retrospect, that's what she would do. Spit on the ground. Spit on Gin, spit on the very idea of him. Then leave him to rot with his grand old memories of Aizen. Son of a bitch.

A man in the police department will inquire politely of her visit as she checks out, will sympathize with her vague discontent, and will ask her out for coffee, and Rangiku will wonder if Gin would care, of if he ever cared. They said his brain didn't work like theirs or hers, and care wasn't even on the list of emotions he could feel.

He could've fooled her.

But he could fool anybody. He escaped the next day, after all. And all Rangiku can think, as the officer comes to her house and gently insists that she be wary, that her mail must be monitored, all she can think is that she hopes he fucks off and enjoys his life with Aizen.

She wants him to keep that damn smile till the end. Till Aizen shoots him in the brains.

Maybe Aizen will have the guts to do him in like a dog. To stab him in the back like she never could.

The red stuff would be all over, then. Gin would be happy enough with that.


End file.
